Apparatus for the quantitative determination of moisture in yarn.



No. 648,868. Patented May I, I900. W. D. HARTSHORNE.

APPARATUS FOR THE QUANTITATIVE DETERMINATION OFNDISTURE IN YARN.

(Application filed Aug. 2, 1897.)

(No Model.)

. of result.

Nrrsn rates IATENT Curios.

VTLLIAM D. HARTSTIORNE, OF METI-IUEN, MASSACHUSETTS.

APPARATUS FOR THE QUANTITATIVE DETERMINATION OF MOISTURE IN YARN.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 648,868, dated May 1,1900.

Application filed August 2, 1897. Serial No. 646,731. (No model.)

To all 1 -70mm it may concern:

Do it known that I, WI LIAM D. HARTS- HORNE,of Methuen, in the county ofEssex and State of Massachusetts, have invented an Improvement inApparatus for the Quantitative Determination of Moisture in Yarn and theLike, of which the following description, in connection with theaccompanying drawings, is a specification, like letters on the drawingsrepresenting like parts.

The hygroscopic property of many substances, and especially of wool andother staples, introduces into their economic manipulation a factorwhich owing to changes in atmospheric conditions is always an uncertainelement and has long been a cause of great inconvenience tomanufacturers and-a'source of uncertainty as to the intrinsic value ofthe output where sold by the pound ora guaranteed weight per yard. Thevariable nature of this factor manifests itself at an early stage inpreparation of staples, and in the drawing and spinning particularlyafiects the apparent count or fineness of the yarn spun to a seriousdegree, for the reason that no satisfrom time to time is a necessaryexpedient if the actual dry weight of roving has changed; but where thechange in weight is purely one of hygroscopic condition such a change ofgear is manifestly improper and can only result in further irregularityand uncertainty This hygroscopic condition varies greatly for differentmaterials in the same atmosphere and is one which a long series ofexperiments on wool, as an example, has shown to be dependent not onlyupon. the socalled relative humidity of the atmosphere, but also uponits temperature and barometric pressure. The relationship,h0wever,evenif it can be mathematically expressed, is one which cannot be determinedfrom a simple inspection of the wet and dry bulb thermometers, nor byany simple calculation therefrom,

so far as known, so that although rules are sometimes laid down bymill-superintendents for maintaining the relative humidity andtemperature at given points in the successive rooms of manufacture bymoistening, heating, or other devices, yet there is no certain knowledgeconveyed thereby as to the specific effect upon the particular materialoperated upon. At nostage does the moisture factor attain such manifestimportance, however, as in the uncertainty which the buyer or vender ofyarn experiences regarding the actual amount of workable materialcontained in the mass sold. I

In some markets sales are made subject to the conditioning-house test,applied to sundelivered. This is a method well known to the trade inEngland and on the cortinent. The samples are first weighed and thendried at a standard temperature until they cease to give up moisture,when they are weighed again, the average loss in weight being taken toindicate the proportion of moisture held by the original mass to theentire weight thereof, and by this means the actual weight of the fibercontained in the mass is determined. Even without setting forth indetail the correction thereafter made upon the basis of an arbitrarystandard to establish the amount of money with which the venders bill isto be debited or credited by reason of the variation in the amount ofmoisture, greater or less,from the required standard, it is obvious thatthe application of this test to every sale, great or small, is, to saythe least, tedious, expensive, and, if necessary, a burden upon trade.That such necessity exists under present mill conditions is wellrecognized abroad, and that it also exists at present in this country,if buyer and vendor would be just with each other, is manifest from thegreat and rapid variation in atmospheric conditions to which we aresubject. If, however, the atmospheric condition of the immediateenvironment in which treatment of the staple is carried on could bemaintained at a uniform state, it is obvious that the amount of moisturewhich the product would contain at the end of the operation could beinferred with much greater certainty than is now possible and thenecessity for any tests, save one or two, eliminated.

The ability to maintain uniform atmospheric conditions in agiyen room isdependent upon three chief factorsviz., the ability to control thetemperature by warming or cooling the air at will, similarly the abilityto con-' trol the degree of moisture present by adding to or taking awayfrom the same, and as a necessary condition precedent to the properregulation of these a method of and apparatus for ascertaining theeffect of their exercise, the result being preferably expressed in termsof the hygroscopic capacity of the suba side elevation, on a reducedscale, of the support B looking to the right, Fig. 1. Fig, 3

is adiagrttmmatic view illustrative of the method of plotting the scaleE.

' My method for determining the quantity of moisture held at any momentin a given quantity, by Weight, of wool or other hygroscopicsubstance,free to absorb moisture from the surrounding air, consists, briefly, infirst determining the weight when bone 1 dry of a quantity of thesubstance of convenient size-as, for example, a skein of woolenyarn-then supporting the same freely in the environment characteristicto the treatment of the substance selected, which'may be in thisinstance the conditioning-room of amill, and-finally determining bysuitable means the increment of its weight while in the environmentselected over the bone-dry weight. This increment will be the exactmeasure of the moisture held in the skein or other. sample attheinstance of observation, and the variations in this increment serveto r gs-indicate exactly the variations of humidity in the adjacentatmosphere of the room or other suitable environment. It will readily beseen that from a series of periodical observations' of the moistureindications furnished by such a sample, whereof the actual bull; andsituation remain unchanged, the normal degree of humidity in theselected en-- vironment can easily be dalculated fio also wnnsuciinmoisturerecord record has been taken the condition of mois the qualityof the product turned sout at different times in the environment whereinthe ture'most favorable to the desired grade of product may bedetermined with equal facility and a basis furnished for subsequentcorrection or regulation ofhumidity, accord-- I ing to and concurrentlywith variance from the-normal indications thereafter observed in thesample, or standard, as it will hereinafter be called at times. l

It will be well to note thatwhen a sample of wool or the like has beenbrought to the bone-dry state its hygroscopic capacity there-- after isslightly less than that of wool, 850., in its conditioned form, andinasmuch as the most important data sought after are the quantities ofmoisture in conditioned wool the bone-dry weight of the standard shouldbe determined not by drying it, but by drying another sample exactlyequal in normal weight, 850., to that which is to become the standard.Thus the-standard will not have scopic capacity, and accordingly theindications of its condition will serve as a basis from which to inferthe moisture condition of substances of the same hygroscopic capacityproduced or treated in the immediate environment of the standard.

Having thus set forth my method, I will now describe the apparatus whichI have invented for aiding to carry'the method into efiect in aconvenient manner. This instrument consists, essentially, of a wheel A,carried by a support B in such a manner that it is free to rotate andnormally maintained at rest in a given position by a weight 0, attachedto the wheel at a point outside its axis by suitable means, preferablyan arm or pointer D, which latter also serves to indicate the extent ofrotation or departure of the wheel from its normal position of rest. Asan aid to the convenient observation of these indications a scale E ismounted on the lower material, preferably steel, bent upon itself at itsupper end to form a. yoke, the upper or closed portion 1) of the yokebeing preferably offset laterally in this instance, as illustrated,

to the right of the transverse medial vertical plane of the support toform shoulders I) b, on which'are. seated and firmly held, as byscrew-plates 1) b the bearings b b for the knifeedge axis a of the wheelA. These bearings, of which only one is shown in Fig. 1, may be of suchmaterial and construction as is vusual in instruments of precision; butI prefer that agate be used, grooved in such va manner as to cause'theknife-edge a to position itself in a line lying in the transverse medialvertical plane of the support and perlatter. The knife-edge a maylikewise be of any suitable material and integral with the material ofthe wheel if the requisite precision can be secured; but I have found itadvisable to use a separate knife-edgeof hardened steel positioned withthe greatest niccty at the axis of the wheel. As a further-precaution toinsure the precision in the location of the knife-edge I prefer tomachine the pe riphery of the wheel A-after the knife-edge has beenfixed in adjusted position, the 0bje'ct of this machining being,primarily, to

provide a true circularseat a (preferably grooved,- a's illustrated)fora flexible cord F,

of silk or the like, the depending ends f f of which are provided withmeans (shown as hooks f f for the attachment, respectively, of thehygroscopic substance H--in this instance a skein of wool-on the one anda counterweight K, of non-hygroscopic material, on the other. Suitablemeans should be provided to prevent slipping of the cord F in thegroove, and as a convenient device-to accomplish this I have illustrateda projection a from the periphery of the wheel engaging a loop f in thecord.

To afiord means for readily setting up the instrument and adjusting itin position, I provide a swivel-clamp M, carrying a rod N, to one end ofwhich is attached the support B by suitable means, as a set-screw b. Therod N is capable of longitudinal adjustment in the clamp, in which itmay be fixed by the thumb-screw m, while the clamp in turn is free tomove about its central pivot 'm and may be secured in adjusted positionby the slot, pin, and set-screw connection m For the sake of conveniencethe clamp M is shown as permanently attached to ablock I, which may besecured in place, as desired, by screws or the like, for which areprovided holes 1). The parts N and B are very accurately machined attheir region of union, so that the rod N will be in parallelism with theknifeedge a, and to aid in bringing this edge to a true horizontal therod N is slabbed oil? on its upper surface at, where a spirit-level maybe ing been thus set up and the wheel set in its bearings, the pointer Dshould stand opposite the middle figure of the scale-in thisinstancemarked l5-which lies in a vertical plane passing through the knife-edge,and if the pointer does not so stand its position is corrected byshifting a correcting-weightaicarried by the wheel A, in a slot a Asthis adjustment is permanent, this weight is preferably adapted to besecured in place by a draft-screw a \Vhen the pointer has thus beenbrought to the vertical, the cord F being in place, the sample ofhygroscopic substance of known bonedry weight-say, a skein of wool II,weighin g when bone dry one hundred gramsis suspended from that one ofthe hookswhich hangs adjacent the side of the scale indicating lowmoisture degrees in this instance hook f -and upon the other hook ishung the counterweight K.

As the normal degree of Wool will absorb in a given locality can beroughly determined and as it is convenient to start with thatapproximate normal as the middle point of the scale, we will assume forillustration that in the room when the instrument has been set up theamount of moisture moisture which scale the counterweight K must weighone hundred and fifteen grams. It will now be understood that anaccession to the moisture in the air of the room with its absorption bythe wool will be accompanied by an increase in the weight of the latter,and the counterweight K being over-balanced the wheel A will be rotatedin the direction of the arrow, causing the pointer D to swing to theright. The extent of this displacement will be in proportion to theamount of moisture absorbed by the wool, and inasmuch as the lever-armof'the pointer and its weight C-t'. e,, the power of the same to resistdisplacement-increases in proportion to the sine of the angle of itsdeparture from the vertical the scale E is plotted (see Fig. 3) as fol1owsviz., an arc E of a circle having the axis of the wheel A as itscenter is drawn, and at the point where this arccuts the vertical 21. a,at 15, a straight line is drawn tangent I From this lineperpendiculars 1) to the arc. are erected at equal intervals, allintersectingthe are E and equal in number to the desired divisions inthe range of weights of moisture through which the hygroscopic substancecan run. For example, the amount of moisture absorbed by one hundredgrams of wool will varyat different times from about five grams totwenty-five grams, and accordingly the scale illustrated has acorresponding number of divisions indicating grams and fractionsthereof. The range for cotton is about eight to fifteen and the rangevaries similarly in different substances. so that the size of the scalemay be varied as found convenient, though the principle of constructionwill remain the same. Theextra arcs E and E are concentric with the arcE and, together with the radial cross-lines E, are merely added to aidthe vision, having nothing to do with the plotting of the divisionpointson the are E which are determined according to the method abovedescribed-- e., by the intersection of the arc with perpendicularserected at equal intervals from a horizontal line. To calibrate thepointer and scale, a known weight is added to one hook or the other andthe deflection of the pointer noted e. g., it a weight of two grams beadded to the counterweight K the pointer would indicate 13, and it itdoes not the weight 0 is adjusted in the slot d until the indications ofthe pointer register with the divisions of the scale. Once calibratedthe instrument furnishes an accurate, absolute, and continuousindication of the varying quantities of moisture held in the sample orstandard and the quantity of the substance whose condi-.

tion it is desired to determine from the standand be. equally free withthe standard to'take up moisture from the atmosphere and: the exposnrebe sufficient. it will snfiice to simply weigh the quantity and deductfrom the total.

weight thereof the proportion of moisture which the instrument indicatesto be present in? the standard, since the same proportion will bepresent in the quantity, the quality and environment being the same.Closelypacked masses, however, should not be tested as above. Itis-obviou'smevertheless,that the product of a manufactory, theatmosphere whereof has been regulated in accordance with the indicationsfurnished by such an instrument, may be made of such a uniform characterthat one or two conditioning-house tests of samples taken from the firstand last masses constituting a quantity of wool purchased will fnrnishthe necessary data' as sat- I isfactorily as a large number of tests,where the atmosphere was regulated by Frule of thumb as heretofore. 'Itwill, further be noted that in the case I have instanced in thisspecification, with the weight oil the standard when bone dry onehundred grams .and' the instrument constructed to read in grams, theindication gives directly at the time of any observation the percentageof moisture to the bone-dry weighte. g., at the normal, fifteen percent. when indicating twelve grams, twelve per cent; when indicatingtwenty-five grams; twenty-five per cent, &c. While thisis a convenientform in which -stood that I do not limit myself to any single form ofindication nor to any given material nor mode of construction, nor ingeneral otherwise than as set forth in the claims,

Having fully described my invention, what 'I claim, and desire to secureby Letters Pat,-

' 1: An' --instr.ument of the class described,

- comprising a support B provided with a scale E, a-yokeb with bearingsW, b, and attaching means; a balance wheel A, having a knife-edge a,calibrating weight a and differentiating member D with slidingadjustingweight O; a flexible carrier F and a portion H of hygroscopicsubstance, and a counter- .weight, depending from the respectivemembers. ofsaid flexible carrier.

2.- An instrument of the class described,

comprising a support; a graduated scale carried thereby, and means topermit universal adjustment of said support and its attachment to asuitable base; a-balance-wheel in said support,.said wheelhavingacalibrating weight and an indicating member extended opposite saidscale and provided with a differentiating weight adjustable slidingly onsaid'indicating. member; and a flexible carrier dependingyfrom saidbalance-wheel and supporting at. one side a portion of hygroscopicsubstance and at the other side a counterweightq In testimony whereof I,have signed my name to this specification in the presence of twosubscribing witnesses;- v

' WILLIAM D. HARTSHORNE. Witnesses: v WILLIAM M. ROGERS, i

7 CHARLES J. MCNAMARA.

